Court orders probe into Tihar inmate`s death

New Delhi: Censuring doctors of Tihar
Jail for their alleged "insensitivity" in treating ailing
inmates, a Delhi court has ordered city police to probe the
death of a prisoner and ascertain if there was any negligence
in providing medicare.

"This is a shocking state of affairs which shows
insensitivity of the treating doctors at Tihar Jail, which led
to the termination of a valuable human life and as such, the
family of the deceased was deprived of the comfort and
consortium of its loved one," chief metropolitan magistrate
Vinod Yadav said, while ordering Hari Nagar Police to probe
convict Bhagwan Singh`s death in August 2010.
The court asked Hari Nagar station house officer to
register a FIR in the matter on the basis of inquest report by
metropolitan magistrate Vandana Jain, who had opined that if
diagnosed earlier, the life of convict could have been saved.

An inquest had been ordered into Singh`s death last
August. The jail inmate had died of infection in his various
vital organs.
Magistrate Jain, in her inquest report noted that a
panel of three senior doctors, which had done the postmortem
at Deen Dayal Upadhayay Hospital here, opined that the manner
of death was "unnatural".

Doctors had further said the diagnosis was delayed due
to the "negligent attitude" of the treating doctors at Tihar.

The magistrate, in her report, had noted that the
convict was not attended by Tihar doctors for more than five
hours due to which his condition deteriorated and he
ultimately died.

"In this (inquest) report (by the magistrate), the
negligent and laxity of treating doctors of central jail,
Tihar have been emphasised," the CMM noted.

The court has now asked the Hari Nagar police to
investigate the matter and file the status report to the
concerned court.